The ‘Anythings Better Than A Blank Wall’ Paint Jam in Penge

Well it’s that time of the year again and at the the turn of the new year we here at London Calling Blog were privileged enough to get to celebrate four years of running the blog with many of the friends we have made over the last four years, artists and photographers alike, with The ‘Anythings Better Than A Blank Wall’ Paint Jam in our hometown of Penge. So it was with extreme delight we were honored to spend our four year anniversary with 17 artists painting 17 cracking new works across the town. Seriously we can’t thank you enough, we had the most amazing time with you all. We are fairly certain all those involved would agree that a fun time was had by all who came along. It was a great weekend with fortunately mild weather for the time of year, much positive energy, conversation and humour all punctuated of course primarily by the magnificent array of artworks which were left in the artists wake.

This years Anniversary Paint Jam is dedicated to Gordon Gibbens who we recently learned sadly passed away in 2017 aged 86 after spending the previous two decades documenting graffiti and street art around London and beyond. In 2012 Gordon was diagnosed with Cancer and spent the next five years never giving up on his love of getting out and about to photograph some fresh works. The inspiring story of Gordon Gibbens has been told in a beautifully put together book entitled ‘How Graffiti Saved My Dad’s Life (At Least For A While)’ by Jane Murphy which tells the story of her Dad’s love of graffiti & street art. The book tells a moving story with such love, strength and humour and all accompanied by a fantastic selection of some of Gordon’s photos. All proceeds from the book are going to St Christopher’s Hospice from where Gordon made some of his final graffiti ventures and we will be hosting a tour of Penge’s street art to raise some money for the Hospice in Sydenham where Gordon’s daughter Jane now volunteers at on Sunday 27th January commencing at Penge East station at 10:30. You can view our blog post on this beautiful publication (covered here) to learn more about Gordon’s inspirational story.

So there is no set price for the tour, it is free, but if you do come along to the tour please bring some cash to donate, no matter how little as it all helps, for a most worthy cause and enjoy what will be a 4 odd hour tour of SprayExhibition20 – comprising over 100 artworks – to raise some funds for the Hospice in honour of Gordon who put such effort to come and see and share the art from Penge when very few people were doing so. When we first started the project in 2016 we had very mixed reactions from the townsfolk – who we are delighted to say by and large love what’s happening now and are very positive about the project – but in 2016 only a handful of dear photographer friends of ours had come down to visit SE20 to see and photograph the newly emerging artwork in Penge. The very first people from around Penge we turned around and unexpectedly saw taking a picture of an artwork, enjoying what they were seeing was Gordon, his daughter Jane and son-in-law Tom photographing Airborne Mark whilst he painted the very first wall for the project just 2 months in and only the 4th artwork of the 197 to date. These guys were the first locals we saw appreciating what we were setting to do with the artists help, a moment that made us think yeah it’s well worth it when a painting can stop someone in the street and brighten their day or even make someone travel out of their way to see something special. So this years Paint Jam goes out to a wise man who was known to say that “Anythings Better Than A Blank Wall”. Gordon got it. Thank you for documenting and sharing the towns art. Respect to Gordon and his dedication to and love of the scene. So feel free to come along for the tour and don’t let the cold stop you, Gordon didn’t let such things stop him from seeing some great art.

As is always the case we couldn’t do what we do here without the help we receive from the artists and friends we have made along the way and this Paint Jam was no exception. We would like to say thanks to firstly all the artists who took part in the weekend, all at their own expense we might add. All of what we do here is for the love of Street Art and what it can bring to a community, we are flattered and feel honoured that so many artists would turn out and paint for us again. Something which is all the more satisfying for us that on this occasion we get to enjoy the results of which every day when wandering about our hometown. We would like to say a big thank you to all the supportive and indulgent space owners – residential and business – for letting the artists work spots old and new. Big thank you to Kevin for all the help in the week before the jam prepping spots day and night with us – and to Street Art Atlas and New Art Rioter who helped us get the last spots buffed the night before painting commenced, all saving us so much time and making it all the more fun. Thank you to Lawrence and Ben for always being willing to lend us ladders and help make things happen. Thank you to Kevin, Street Art Atlas, New Art Rioter, M_Frenchi, Spike & Tanya Nash for all the help elsewhere over the weekend, carrying paint & ladders around town, stopping artists from getting run over and everything else that it took to get so many spots painted! We really couldn’t do it all without all your help. Lastly and by no means least, thank you to everyone who came down to Penge to enjoy the weekend – shout out to Zomsonsta, UGZ, the Zappa clan and Pistoja for coming down to join the fun – as well as all the local residents who passed by snapping pictures and taking the time to make nice comments to the artists about the fantastic artworks they were putting up around Penge!

Without further ado we hope you enjoy the images from the weekend, there are many, but we feel the weekend deserves it with the high number of high quality pieces produced. Thank You all.

SPZero76 at work.

Dotmaster at work.

Woskerski & Core246 at work.

Woskerksi at work.

Core246 at work.

Roo at work.

SPZero76, SkyHigh & JXC at work.

DRT & Dope at work.

Mr Cenz at work.

Toas at work.

Nolij at work.

DRT at work.

Aspire at work.

JXC at work.

Hunto at work.

SkyHigh at work.

SPZero76 & SkyHigh at work.

Work by Irony in Station Road.

Work by Irony.

Detail of work by Irony.

Detail of work by Irony.

Work by Irony.

Works by Dotmaster & Irony in Station Road offering the first glimpse of Penge’s art scene when arriving at Penge East.

Works by SPZero76 & SkyHigh in Bycroft Street.

‘Back to Nature’ by SPZero76 in Bycroft Street.

Detail of work by SPZero76.

Detail of work by SPZero76.

Detail of work by SPZero76.

Detail of work by SPZero76.

Night-view of ‘Back to Nature’ by SPZero76.

Night-view of ‘Back to Nature’ by SPZero76.

Work by SkyHigh in Bycroft Street.

Detail of work by SkyHigh.

Detail of work by SkyHigh.

Detail of work by SkyHigh.

Work by SkyHigh.

Night-view of work by SkyHigh.

Work by JXC in Bycroft Street.

Work by JXC.

Detail of work by JXC.

Detail of work by JXC.

Detail of work by JXC.

Work by JXC.

Work by Hunto in Penge High Street.

Detail of work by Hunto.

Detail of work by Hunto.

Work by Hunto.

Work by Dotmaster in Penge High Street.

Detail of work by Dotmaster.

Detail of work by Dotmaster.

Detail of work by Dotmaster.

Detail of work by Dotmaster.

Detail of work by Dotmaster.

Detail of work by Dotmaster.

Detail of work by Dotmaster.

Detail of work by Dotmaster.

Detail of work by Dotmaster.

Detail of work by Dotmaster.

Detail of work by Dotmaster.

Work by Dotmaster.

Work by Aspire in Penge High Street.

Detail of work by Aspire.

Detail of work by Aspire.

Detail of work by Aspire.

Work by Mr Cenz in Southey Street.

Detail of work by Mr Cenz.

Detail of work by Mr Cenz.

Detail of work by Mr Cenz.

Detail of work by Mr Cenz.

Detail of work by Mr Cenz.

Work by Mr Cenz.

Work by Mr Cenz.

Work by Aero in Southey Street.

Detail of work by Aero.

Detail of work by Aero.

Works by Aero & Mr Cenz in Southey Street.

Work by She in Southey Street.

Work by She joining works by Maikel Walkman, Airborne Mark, TRUST.iCON, Mr Christa & Alice Pasquini down Southey Street.

Work by Woskerksi in ‘Secret Penge’.

Work by Woskerski.

Work by Core246 in ‘Secret Penge’.

Work by Core246.

Detail of work by Core246.

Detail of work by Core246.

Work by Core246.

Work by Toas in ‘Secret Penge’.

Work by Toas.

Work by Nolij in Maple Road.

Night-shot of work by Nolij.

Work by DRT in Maple Road.

Work by DRT.

Detail of work by DRT.

Work by Dope in Maple Road.

Work by Dope.

Work by Roo in Padua Road.

Detail of work by Roo.

Detail of work by Roo.

Work by Roo.

Our tour of SprayExhibition20 in memory of Gordon and to raise funds for St Christopher’s Hospice in Sydenham from where Gordon made some of his final graffiti ventures commences at Penge East at 10:30am on Sunday 27th January. Gordon’s daughter Jane will be on hand to collect the donations and will have copies of the wonderful book mentioned above for sale to anyone interested with all proceeds going to the Hospice. To those of you who have taken the tours we did in the summer, we have plenty of magnificent new artworks to showoff. We hope to see you there.